


The Claire And Eli Show

by Lil_leels



Series: The Claire and Eli Show [1]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: F/F, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-16
Updated: 2016-07-20
Packaged: 2018-06-08 18:02:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6867733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lil_leels/pseuds/Lil_leels
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In an AU (sort of...) where there are TWO Shepards! The fish tanks of the world don't stand a chance!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Origins

**Author's Note:**

> 2151 - Claire Shepard is born  
> 2154 - Eli Shepard is born  
> 2171 - Skyllian Blitz occurs

Clairece Shepard entered the world on a starship - August 22nd 2152. She had been born into a very long standing military family, a family which could trace their roots through every military branch and every war for many,  _many,_ generations. Her parents, Hannah and Simon Shepard, were both decorated Alliance soldiers. Expectations were high but the tiny sleeping girl, wrapped snuggly in her mother's arms had no concept of it. She slept even as their ship, patrolling the Exodus Cluster, maneuvered it's way through space at faster than light speeds. Space and the galaxy at large, became the back drop of Claire's life; the familiar whir of engines her favorite lullaby. 

Two years later, the Shepard family added Elliott Shepard to the mix. Still on a starship but this time in May. Claire, at almost 2, was very cautious about the new addition. The precocious toddler realised her world had been irrevocably altered but had not yet formed an opinion on whether this was a good thing or a bad one. Truthfully, like most siblings, her opinion changed often depending on circumstance. For instance, when Eli began walking and happened to develop a habit of crashing through whatever Claire was doing with the sole mission to destroy towers of blocks or sand, she had felt personally betrayed by her parents brash decision to bring a monster into her world. However, there were other instances when Claire felt that Eli was her greatest ally - for example the time when Claire, 8, and Eli, 6, had been corned in a back ally of a colony world by local kids threatening to jump the 'alliance presence.' 

Like most siblings, Claire and Eli had their differences and their similarities. Both shared their father's dark hair and both had inherited their mother's grey eyes. But Eli resembled the Shepard side of the family - with strong mule-ish features. As a child the features seemed too large for his face, making him a frequent target of teasing. But as he grew up, he grew into them. Claire, however, took on the softer features of her paternal side. Both were rather short for their gender - Claire being only about 5'2" and Eli being only 5'8". They also were both gifted biotics. 

That is, of course, nothing to do with their personalities. Every Shepard was endowed with an intrinsic stubbornness that had been handed down soldier to soldier for generations. But for Claire and Eli the expressions of those wills were entirely disparate. Claire took every thing to heart, deeply passionate about the world, and hid it all behind a polite and logical mask. Claire had a sensitive heart and an almost obsessive desire to hide it. The resulting affect being a somewhat reserved academic type. Eli took the other extreme - he was a roll with the punches pragmatist who let very little bother him for long. Very little effected him deeply, being a good natured type, but his expressions - the good and the bad - were usually extreme. And fleeting. In their childhood, their disparate natures meant that the fight still hurting Claire had already been forgotten by Eli. In time, their disparate natures softened as Claire learned to let go a bit and Eli learned tact, if not sensitivity. 

The first real surprise for Hannah and Simon Shepard was when Claire,  _not_ Eli, rejected military life. Eli, at 16, had refused the programs and classes offered. Claire, on the other hand, had diligently taken and excelled in them. And while Hannah and Simon were busy dealing with her brother's rebellion, Claire had applied for to universities across the galaxy. On the day she turned 18, she broke the news to her parents. She would  _not_ be going to boot camp and she would be attending the University of Oxford back on Earth. She wanted to study interspecies communication. Her birthday, falling a mere four days before classes began, left little room for arguments or hard goodbyes.  

Dinner that night was a tense affair. The silence was deafening as two life-ers sat shocked by their eldest's decision. Ultimately it was Hannah who came to enough to give her daughter the only advise she could: 'If you won't be military, be your best at whatever else it is you decide to do.' She had then gruffly hugged her daughter before hurrying off to bed. Claire, who was to leave in the morning, took it as a grudging acceptance and left for Uni feeling quite pleased with her mini-rebellion. 

Eli was shocked. While he rebelled against his parents forced military ideas, he never dreamed he would actually escape them. That Claire had amazed him. Fortunately, or unfortunately, Eli was left the sole attention of his parents. Eli missed his sister desperately, if only because she would have been a distraction from what felt like constant scrutiny. Eli began planning his own rebellion. That was when the station Eli was on finally allowed for a class on combat biotics. Eli, who loved using his biotics, signed on immediately. 

The instructor was a beautiful Asari name Ce'Da T'Neva and Eli had never met anyone like her before. The adolescent fell hard for her and threw himself diligently into his work. The crush was, of course, unrequited and if T'Neva knew anything of her student's affections, she hid it well. What T'Neva did see, and encourage, was Eli's developing biotic skill as a vanguard. Which is how the Shepards three found themselves in a recruitment office on Eli's 18th birthday. Hannah and Simon were equal parts shocked and elated by Eli's decision. Boot camp would begin in June, the following month.

Hannah and Simon had much to be proud of as both of their children excelled in their chosen fields, advancing quickly. Claire earned her first degree in a matter of 2 years and quickly worked her way through her doctorate. Her thesis (On Intercultural Communication Between Alien Species and the Influence of Ancient Prothean Interactions) afforded her many grants, publications, and accolades. She quickly became a leading expert on both prothean and interspecies communication. Eli excelled at boot camp, impressing his instructors and was quickly put on track to join officer ranks. The Shepard legacy was already well respected but Hannah and Simon could not have asked for a better heir. 

But two such successful careers left little time for family reunions. The two siblings kept in touch in that way siblings do - sending each other hilarious tidbits or things to gode one another. But they had not actually seen each other since Claire had left for Uni. Claire had spent the first few years working diligently to earn her degree, after Eli joined the alliance her parents had spent some time in London with her, but Eli hadn't been able to get leave. Which is why, nearly 7 years later, the duo ended up on Elysium. 

Eli had some shore leave from the SSV Agincourt where he was stationed and Claire had a small break in her lecture circuit which was occurring in a nearby system. Claire had hopped aboard a shuttle and made her way to Elysium. When Claire saw her brother in his fatigues wearing his big grin she promptly said 'I'm proud of you squirt.' To which Eli grimaced and said 'Whatever munchkin.' 

The two spent the evening catching up. Claire also got to know a few of Eli's squadmates. The siblings retired that evening with plans to meet for a late breakfast. The attack came some time between placing their order and getting their waffles. For months, the only thing Eli would mention about Elysium was how badly he wanted those waffles. Claire, on the other hand, hasn't touched waffles since. 


	2. The Blitz

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Waffles, pirates, grenades... just another breakfast for the Shepard siblings.

'I'll have the Belgian waffles, with loads of syrup and whip cream!' Eli said with a salacious wink at the waiter who could have been their grandmother. 

The 'grandmother' was having none of it. 'Right, cavaties for the soldier and how about you, Miss?'

'Coffee, please, black.' Claire replied. 

'Awwww - come on - the Alliance is paying!' Eli teases, waggling his eyebrows. Claire grins, Eli has always made her grin. 

'Alright. And some waffles - but easy on the syrup and no whip cream.' Claire relents. The waitress nods and walks away. 'Satisfied?' Claire asks her brother. 

'Not as much as you will be when you get the waffles.' Eli counters. 

Claire threw a butter packet at him. It hits square against his chest and he bursts into laughter. It was good to see that military life hadn't changed him much, Claire thought. The two were mid-verbal banter when the sirens went off. 

'Fuck!' said Eli, his chair which he had been leaning back on two legs in, crashed forward slamming the front legs into the ground with a heavy thud. 'Proximity alarms.' 

Claire nods as if she understands the significance of this, but she doesn't. Eli stands, claps his credit chit information down on the table, and goes to leave. Claire, uncertain as to what is happening, follows him. They enter the streets, sirens wailing, and people screaming and running. The street they exited on to was a main drag, easily connecting to the space docks. When they look downhill towards them, Claire gasped. Pirates were pouring out of the ships, guns out, mowing down the local security force. 

'Fuck!' Eli says again, unclipping his pistol. 'Here.' He offers the gun to Claire. 'Take this and get someplace safe.' Claire takes the gun and allows her fingers to remember the long forgotten process of going over the gun, checking the clip and looking at it's scope alignment. Satisfied that she remembered what she was doing, Eli nodded and turned back to join the fray. 

Claire watched in horror as her little brother charged towards the bursts of gunfire. She watched in horror as the people around her ran. Paralyzed Claire watched a young mother trip and fall, her hold on her child felling the young girl too. The mother and child were too far for Claire to reach personally, but a stampede of people were running straight for them, threatening to trample the pair to death. Claire's biotics leapt forward with an answer before she could, forming a protective barrier around them and forcing the crowd to part. When the woman stood and scooped the child up, Claire let the barrier fall and made up her mind. She would fetch medical help for the forces being torn apart by the pirates at the dock. 

The medical center was a few blocks away and, unfortunately, under seige. The large ample space around the building made it a strategic landin zone and the fact that it cut off aid to the allies was a bonus. Claire, seeing enemy forces, swung around and to the right into a nearby doorway. She needed a vantage point, so she took the stairs two at a time heading for the highest floor. The door on her left suddenly flew open and a muscled arm wrapped around claire, dragging her backwards into the room. Claire hardly had time to register what was happening before a hand clamped down around her mouth. 

 

\--

 

Eli ran hard, pulling up his omni-tool to communicate with his squad. He wasn't technically their XO but as their current XO was on the Agincourt, the rest would follow his lead. From the Agincourt 5 of his 6 man squad was on the ground. The Agincourt may have more teams on mission, gathering supplies or elsewhere but as far as Eli knew he had 5 men to combat the drove of pirates oozing out over the docks. Hillis, his sniper, had already radioed to say he found a spot for himself and was picking off pirates. That left Sanchez, medic, Yang, adept, McVeigh, soldier, and himself, the vanguard. Sanchez was a decent shot but a better medic. So Eli put him to establishing a field hospital for the wounded. Most of the initial defenders were dead but the second wave of reinforcements was rallying and still stood a chance. Yang, a fire-y Chinese woman who could warp you into tomorrow was already at the makeshift barricade. McVeigh and Eli joined her shortly. The invading forces has been temporarily pushed back. Those at the barricade were surprisingly few - only 20 or 30 - in number, half of which were civilian volunteers who had never actually fired a gun. The other half, the paid forces, were mostly wounded. Even Yang had a sloppy medigel patch pasted over her arm. 

'Sanchez?' Eli radioed over. 'Better bring your extra supplies. You've got 2 minutes to get these men in fighting shape.' Eli tried not to press his thumbs to his temples. He had learned early on that his men needed him to be confident, even more so when they weren't actually military. 'Hillis pick off who you can but mostly you're our alarm system. Let us know when they make another press.' 

'Aye Shepard.' was the gruff reply. 

Then Eli pitched his voice for every defender to hear. 'Well done. We've held off their first advance. Eat something and drink some water. See McVeigh,' Eli gestured toward the burly soldier, 'for minor injuries. Major injuries report to our medic. Biotics report to Yang.' With each name Eli gestured to the corresponding person. 'Dismissed.' 

The defenders broke into a flurry of motion. McVeigh set about fixing the worst of the minor injuries with medigel and used bandages for the rest. Only 3 men were seriously injured. One man had a gut wound and every one knew he wouldn't last long. One man had a serious concussion, it seemed he had gotten the butt end of a riffle. What wasn't clear was if it was an enemy or ally's rifle. The last was a veteran who had several bullet wounds but in non-critical places. The soldier insisted that Eli take his light armour. It wasn't the best fit and Eli usually preferred heavy armour but any armour was better than the fatigues he was in. As for biotics, only one reported to Yang. When Yang was satisfied that he could produce a passible biotic attack, she directed him to focus on his pistol and use biotics on choke points. 

Eli went about setting his men in position, directing the right guard to Yang and the left to McVeigh. The center technically would answer to the only paid defender still standing while Eli charged round to wherever he was needed. 

'Incoming Shepard. Shit! You've got heavies inbound.' Hillis called out. 

'How many?' Eli called out, scanning the street and docks before him. 

'I count 3 at least. IF you lay down cover fire, I can take out one. Yang has one almost 20 meters off her side and you can take the center. He seems to be directing things anyhow. Hillis chirped. 

'Roger that. On my mark.' Eli replied. He turns to address his defenders, pitching his voice again. 'Alright team, the Agincourt will be here soon but until then we hold. Every person here today has a reason to fight, a home to defend, a family to protect. Let's do them proud!' As Eli talks, Claire's mind pops unbidden into his mind. Offering up a quick prayer for her safety, the 22 year old prepared to face death. He had no illusions that the Agincourt would reach them in time but he would muster his men and buy them as much time as possible. When the first line of pirates appeared, Eli cried a fierce war cry and charged. 


End file.
